AFL-CIO Pushes Universal Health Care as Top Priority in '08 Election

http://www.workforce.com/section/00/article/25/13/05.html

The AFL-CIO used the release of federal data showing a drop in the number of Americans who get employer-sponsored health care to launch a nationwide campaign to make universal health insurance the centerpiece of the 2008 presidential election.

The effort will put increased pressure on states and the federal government to alter the current system of employer-based health insurance because the erosion of coverage is disproportionately hurting the middle class, analysts say.

The Census Bureau data, released August 28, showed a drop in the percentage of Americans who receive health care through an employer—to 59.7 percent in 2006, down from 60.2 percent in 2005 and continuing a 20-year trend.

Census officials said the change constituted nearly half of the 2.2 million people who were added to the ranks of the uninsured in the past year, bringing that total to 47 million. The number of uninsured was 44.8 million in 2005.

“We are making the 2008 elections a mandate on fixing our broken system,” AFL-CIO president John Sweeney told reporters.

Two days after the census data was released, a poll by the Kaiser Family Foundation showed health care reform as the most important domestic issue cited by Americans—second only to the war in Iraq.

FULL story at link.

Q: Why don’t you offer or support a specific health care reform plan?

A: There is no real chance that meaningful health care reform will be enacted while this president is still in office. Rather than fight a losing battle, we are mobilizing a 1-million-member mobilization team of activists and working with a broad group of allies to keep comprehensive health care reform at the top of the political agenda in 2008 and to ensure that the real work of fixing the health care system actually gets done after the elections.

http://aflcio.org/issues/healthcare/fix.cfm